Project management: a work-related situation

Describe a work-related situation you feel could be improved. For example, you want to streamline the process for reimbursing employees, or you want to create a high-tech website for your small business but have no experience in programming or graphic creation (Pick either the streamline process for reimbursing employees, or pick the one where you want to create a high-tech website, pick the one that is easier for you to explain to me, or pick both). Then consider the following:

Identify the needs of the situation?
What is the project objective?
What assumptions, if any, should be made regarding the project to be undertaken?
Who are the main people or departments that need to be involved in this project?
What are the risks involved?
Why would your project be considered a project?

Solution Preview

I will base this question on streamlining employee reimbursements.

1) The needs of the situation.

- here you need to explain what is the problem. In this case, let's say that employees pay for things out of their own pocket (like when they travel, or buy equipment...) and then they need to get reimbursed by the firm.
- You would need to understand the situation at hand. Let's say currently an employee must submit the claim to accounting, they need to make duplicates of their receipts, fill out a long document, get their managers signature, submit it, and then wait 8-10 weeks to get reimbursed.
- The needs would be: make the process more user friendly and have the employees be reimbursed within 1-2 weeks
- The new process could be done using an intranet system, where employees submit a simple form online, which is easily found on the server. They then send their original copies of their receipts by internal mail and they then can get a direct deposit of their purchase within the new time frame.

2) The objectives
- to shorten the process
- make the application easier
- get all the employees familiar with the new processes
- assess how much money the new process will save the company ...

Solution Summary

This posting will look at a business problem, and provide information on how to construct a proposal on how to deal with this project.